MICROMANAGING

[Anonymous]

Nannies: Please define Micromanaging...Has anyone experienced being micromanaged? How do you take it?

[Anonymous]

Micromanaging is what happens if you take a job with a WAHM/SAHM. The ones who stand behind you and tell you how to rock DC, or how warm DC baby food should be. The kind who throw fits if DC sleeps a minute longer than schedule, and generally act like your an idiot who has no experience.

How do I handle it? I quit.

[Anonymous]

My definition would be: providing a level of supervision or input that makes my expertise extraneous.

Most nannies take pride in obtaining as much knowledge as possible about their field, both by gaining experience and by researching. I babysit nights and weekends so that I can keep my hand in with age groups younger and older than my current charges. I am also constantly reading books about child development to track my current charges, or explore things that their parents believe to be a priority (e.g., my current employers buy any toy that claims to boost IQ, so I am readig books about brain function and intellectual development by age, a previous family was concerned about physical development, so I focused on fine motor activities in my reading).

In addition to generally trusting your nanny to know what she's doing, and trusting her to know your child, you should also be able to trust that she and your child will develop their own working relationship. For example, one of the infants I care for has reflux, so her mom likes to feed her in her chair (vertical). I prefer to feed her in my lap, so I can control the degree of incline midfeed (slowly leaning her farther back to allow for the bottle getting empty). This MB knows that I do things differently, but trusts that I am taking her advice ("baby does best eating vertically") and the child's needs and personality into account. If this MB insisted that I feed the baby in the chair because her way is the only correct way, that would be micromanaging. If you are going to insist there is only one correct way to do things, then you should 't bother paying for an experienced nanny. Get a 19-year-old with no experience, pay them minimum wage and tell them how to do every single thing. But if you have a nanny with experience and research to back up her choices, then let her do her thing, and if there is a problem (for example, if the infant i was feeding my own way was consistently eating less with me than with mom) address that up front ("baby isn't eating as much for you as she does for me on the weekends. Could you try feeding her this way for a week and see if her intake increases?"). But if the nanny is getting the results (happy, healthy, thriving kids) then her approach is just as valid.

[Anonymous]

I worked for a SAHM for 6 months who had twins. She would check the bottles after i warmed them 89% of the time. JESSUSSS CHRISTTT

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I worked for a SAHM for 6 months who had twins. She would check the bottles after i warmed them 89% of the time. JESSUSSS CHRISTTT

Never ever ever work for a SAHM. Unless they are chronically I'll, and need assistance this woman have hired you as their personal servants, and will get off on the power they have over you.

[Anonymous]

*ill

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Micromanaging is what happens if you take a job with a WAHM/SAHM. The ones who stand behind you and tell you how to rock DC, or how warm DC baby food should be. The kind who throw fits if DC sleeps a minute longer than schedule, and generally act like your an idiot who has no experience.

How do I handle it? I quit.

+1. My former MB was so over-the-top that she put the bottle basket into the dish washer before the babies were even born so she "could get used to not having that space".

See ya!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Micromanaging is what happens if you take a job with a WAHM/SAHM. The ones who stand behind you and tell you how to rock DC, or how warm DC baby food should be. The kind who throw fits if DC sleeps a minute longer than schedule, and generally act like your an idiot who has no experience.

How do I handle it? I quit.

Not all of us have had negative experiences with WAHM/SAHMs. In over 12 years as a nanny I have worked for a number of MBs who either stayed home or worked at home.

#1: SAHM, 4 kids, 3 years, divide-and-conquer strategy, worked really well, I'm still good friends with former MB
#2: SAHM, 3 kids, just over 2 years, divide-and-conquer strategy, worked well, still friendly with the family
#3: part SAH/part WAH, 3 kids, 2 1/2 years, divide-and-conquer strategy, no micromanaging, MB and I just had very different ideas on how to do things...she still let me do as I saw fit when I was in charge
#4: WAHM, 2 kids, a little over 3 years and counting, she trusts my judgement implicitly, tied with job#1 as my favorite

I briefly (7 weeks) worked for a micromanaging SAHM and I quit, citing her as the reason when she accused me of not liking her children upon handing her my notice. My other position was for a woman who worked out of the house, and she was a huge micromanager. Thankfully we traveled quite a bit and she was less micromanaging when we traveled so that's the only reason I stuck it out for our agreement period.

Please don't be so quick to judge SAHM and WAHMs. Some of them are really wonderful.

Also want to add that I completely agree with PP 00:55.

[Anonymous]

It depends on the MB. I work for a SAHM and it's not that bad. I like having her around because she helps clean up after lunch or watches the kids while I prepare lunch, etc.

She doesn't do any of the things people above mentioned above like tell me how warm the baby's food should be, how to rock baby, etc.

We have a good friendship.

[Anonymous]

what is SAHM & WAHM?

[Anonymous]

I've worked for a sahm mom, wahm mom and wahd and have never encountered the issues pps have complained about. I'm sure there are crazy moms out there but maybe the pps just weren't very good nannies. Who knows.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:what is SAHM & WAHM?

Stay at home mom

Work at home mom

[Anonymous]

Micromanaging is that mom who calls you 300 times a day to see what you are doing, where you are, who you are with, what the kids ate or if they pooped or not. Also planning out the entire day for you drives me nuts. You have to learn to let go. My boss used to work from home one day a week and it drove me nuts so we talked about it and I told her it was like if her boss sat in her office on her lap and watched her type all day or listened to her phone calls and she got the hint and decided it was better to go in early and come home early and let me go home than it was to loose me and I have been here for 8 years now.

[Anonymous]

My definition would be: providing a level of supervision or input that makes my expertise extraneous.

Most nannies take pride in obtaining as much knowledge as possible about their field, both by gaining experience and by researching. I babysit nights and weekends so that I can keep my hand in with age groups younger and older than my current charges. I am also constantly reading books about child development to track my current charges, or explore things that their parents believe to be a priority (e.g., my current employers buy any toy that claims to boost IQ, so I am readig books about brain function and intellectual development by age, a previous family was concerned about physical development, so I focused on fine motor activities in my reading).

In addition to generally trusting your nanny to know what she's doing, and trusting her to know your child, you should also be able to trust that she and your child will develop their own working relationship. For example, one of the infants I care for has reflux, so her mom likes to feed her in her chair (vertical). I prefer to feed her in my lap, so I can control the degree of incline midfeed (slowly leaning her farther back to allow for the bottle getting empty). This MB knows that I do things differently, but trusts that I am taking her advice ("baby does best eating vertically") and the child's needs and personality into account. If this MB insisted that I feed the baby in the chair because her way is the only correct way, that would be micromanaging. If you are going to insist there is only one correct way to do things, then you should 't bother paying for an experienced nanny. Get a 19-year-old with no experience, pay them minimum wage and tell them how to do every single thing. But if you have a nanny with experience and research to back up her choices, then let her do her thing, and if there is a problem (for example, if the infant i was feeding my own way was consistently eating less with me than with mom) address that up front ("baby isn't eating as much for you as she does for me on the weekends. Could you try feeding her this way for a week and see if her intake increases?"). But if the nanny is getting the results (happy, healthy, thriving kids) then her approach is just as valid.

Thank you for this really excellent post, PP. I especially appreciate your specific example.

I'm an MB and I will be honest enough to say that from most of these threads, I have the impression that nannies see any direction at all as micromanaging. Combined with the many threads on how nannies ignore any direction and do what they want, or try to get away with doing nothing, I sometimes find it hard to trust nannies.

That said, your post gives new food for thought about what is micromanaging.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

My definition would be: providing a level of supervision or input that makes my expertise extraneous.

Most nannies take pride in obtaining as much knowledge as possible about their field, both by gaining experience and by researching. I babysit nights and weekends so that I can keep my hand in with age groups younger and older than my current charges. I am also constantly reading books about child development to track my current charges, or explore things that their parents believe to be a priority (e.g., my current employers buy any toy that claims to boost IQ, so I am readig books about brain function and intellectual development by age, a previous family was concerned about physical development, so I focused on fine motor activities in my reading).

In addition to generally trusting your nanny to know what she's doing, and trusting her to know your child, you should also be able to trust that she and your child will develop their own working relationship. For example, one of the infants I care for has reflux, so her mom likes to feed her in her chair (vertical). I prefer to feed her in my lap, so I can control the degree of incline midfeed (slowly leaning her farther back to allow for the bottle getting empty). This MB knows that I do things differently, but trusts that I am taking her advice ("baby does best eating vertically") and the child's needs and personality into account. If this MB insisted that I feed the baby in the chair because her way is the only correct way, that would be micromanaging. If you are going to insist there is only one correct way to do things, then you should 't bother paying for an experienced nanny. Get a 19-year-old with no experience, pay them minimum wage and tell them how to do every single thing. But if you have a nanny with experience and research to back up her choices, then let her do her thing, and if there is a problem (for example, if the infant i was feeding my own way was consistently eating less with me than with mom) address that up front ("baby isn't eating as much for you as she does for me on the weekends. Could you try feeding her this way for a week and see if her intake increases?"). But if the nanny is getting the results (happy, healthy, thriving kids) then her approach is just as valid.

Thank you for this really excellent post, PP. I especially appreciate your specific example.

I'm an MB and I will be honest enough to say that from most of these threads, I have the impression that nannies see any direction at all as micromanaging. Combined with the many threads on how nannies ignore any direction and do what they want, or try to get away with doing nothing, I sometimes find it hard to trust nannies.

That said, your post gives new food for thought about what is micromanaging.

PP, I think you have to take what is said here with a grain of salt. This is a place where many of the posters come to vent their frustrations. That, in addition to the anonymous nature of the internet and how that affects people's interactions, as well as the trolls on this board, make it a bit of an Alice in Wonderland experience when you come here. As a nanny, I get the same feeling about MBs-- they must mostly be micromanaging, hating/looking down on their nannies, and cheap cheap cheap, if this board is to be believed-- only, then I remember how wonderful (though flawed) my MB is, and how MBs just want what's best for their children, etc, along with the other things I mentioned above. And then I can breathe a sigh of relief